Jacki Kellum Photo – Garden Gate in the Ozark Mountains

“When the hornet hangs in the holly hock, And the brown bee drones i’ the rose, And the west is a red-streaked four-o’clock, And summer is near its close It’s Oh, for the gate, and the locust lane; And dusk, and dew, and home again!”
– Madison Cawein

Gene Boerner Rose in Jacki Kellum Garden

I am a professional storyteller, and at one time, I performed quite often.  But people who watch me on stage would never guess that I am actually almost reclusive. Especially in the age of delivered “everything,” if I never left my home again, I would probably be fine. Yet, when I am out among people, I give it everything that I have. When I am out among other folks, people might mistake me for a social butterfly, but I always feel a gentle tugging, urging me to get back home and into my garden again and again and again.

Jacki Kellum Garde

Zephirine Drouhin Rose in Jacki Kellum Garden

I grow many rose bushes, and most of those roses climb and provide even more privacy as they branch out across their supports,

Morning Glory Blooms in Late October – Jacki Kellum Garden

Most people have volunteer morning glories with a smaller flower than this, and if you have that vine, you have regular morning glory vines. Some people consider morning glory to be a noxious weed. This is an heirloom variety of that plant. It has larger blooms. My grandmother grew this vine during the 1950s, and I plant it intentionally. This variety is named Heavenly Blue, but it is not the Heavenly Blue that you find in most seed racks. I order this heirloom seed from Burpee.

 

My garden is my therapy, but the therapy doesn’t work if people are around me all the time. It only works when I am alone.

For that reason, I have tall fences around my gardens, and beyond those fences, I have arbors that carry my plants even higher into the sky. Unless I want people to enter my garden, I am all alone out there.

We often think of a fence as something to keep a creature inside an area–i.e. fencing cattle or a dog or chickens inside. I actually think that the more important purpose of a fence is that of serving as a screen–to keep others out–to create boundaries, to provide spaces for privacy, to establish sanctuaries. With that in mind, what is the purpose of a gate?

A gate is the place where we let other people in.

Jacki Kellum Garden Gate – Watercolor

“Come into the garden, Maud, For the black bat, night, has flown, Come into the garden, Maud, I am here at the gate alone; Maud And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad, And the musk of the rose is blown. For a breeze of morning moves, And the planet of Love is on high, Beginning to faint in the light that she loves On a bed of daffodil sky.” – Tennyson. Maud Part 1

I do agree that fences make good neighbors–sometimes. When we are behind our fences–screened away from society–we are shielded from people–from playing the “game.” But I also like gates. I like the fact that a gate allows us to leave our cloisters, and it allows our chosen friends to come inside.

If you are a dreamer, come in,
If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar,
A hope-er, a pray-er, a magic bean buyer…
If you’re a pretender, come sit by my fire
For we have some flax-golden tales to spin.
Come in!
Come in! – Shel Silverstein

 

 

 

 

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